[Evaluation of fast MR imaging with suspended respiration in hepatic tumors]

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the possibility of qualitative diagnosis in hepatic tumors by fast magnetic resonance (MR) imaging with suspended respiration using partial flip angle and gradient echo technique at 0.5 T. Fast MR imaging does not replace conventional spin-echo procedures, but is complementary to it. For the analysis of contrast as a function of flip angle, 32 hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs) of nodular type and 11 hemangiomas were examined with flip angles of 20, 40 and 60 degrees on sagittal images. In general, the lesions showed relatively high and low intensities on the images with flip angles of 20 and 60 degrees, respectively. On the images with flip angle of 40 degrees, signal-to-noise (S/N) ratio was higher, but contrast between tumor and liver was lesser than with that of other angles. The change of contrast-to-noise (C/N) ratio between the flip angles of 20 and 60 degrees in hemangiomas was larger than that in HCCs, significantly. It was useful for evaluation of lesions to observe the change of C/N ratio, and it was necessary for detection of lesions to obtain the images with at least three flip angles. For dynamic MR imaging, 18 HCCs including 5 cases after transcatheter chemoembolization (TCE) and 5 hemangiomas were examined with flip angle of 40 degrees. With employment of Gd-DTPA, S/N ratio and contrast were improved in many cases, and hemodynamics of tumors was able to be observed. It was suggested that dynamic MR imaging was useful especially in evaluation of efficacy of TCE using lipiodol.